


the dumping grounds

by oh_simone



Category: Agent Carter (TV)
Genre: Gen, WIP Amnesty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-01
Updated: 2017-01-02
Packaged: 2018-09-14 02:56:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9156883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oh_simone/pseuds/oh_simone
Summary: bits and snippets of things that never really pulled together in 2016. Mostly Agent Carter. Actually, all Agent Carter-- apparently, that's all I've written in the past year.





	1. east coast blues

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the adventures of Jack and Angie, in the absence of Peggy and Daniel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I actually started this mid-season 2, and it was supposed to be kind of a flipside portrait of the folks left behind in New York. I'd wanted to write about Jack and Angie missing Daniel and Peggy, and dealing with a quieter existence, and the burden of unsaid things.  
> The finale jossed what I'd written, and so I'd tried to adjust for that but it just didn't come together properly, so finally, I'm admitting to myself that I'll probably never finish this. It was a joy to write more Angie though.

Peggy wasn’t terribly good at trusting him or his opinion, and she never called from Los Angeles. Jack didn’t take offense; they worked well together, but only when the planets aligned just so. When he didn’t want to strangle her in frustration, he was reluctantly fond of her, and he suspected she felt the same about him, more or less. His opinion of her even improved, now that she was absent and their office solve rate had noticeably slowed.  It was accompanied, nevertheless, by equal parts relief.

Daniel, though, liked him less, but tolerated him better.

“Thompson, you arrogant prick,” Daniel growled from the other end of the continent.

Well, most of the time.

“I don't know what to tell you, Danny Boy,” Jack replied with great relish. His Wednesday afternoon was already looking up. “you already have Rose and Carter, I think tit for tat is fair isn’t it? We’ve got to share office resources; we’re on the same side after all.”

On the other end, his west coast counterpart made an inarticulate noise of exasperation, and Jack thrilled to hear it as he settled into his chair.

 "They’re people, Jack, not... staplers."

He laughed and gave in as he’d always intended. "Alright, alright. Keep Samberly, just send me his specs on the propellant thingmajiggy. I’ll get Doobin to take a crack at it."

"I can do that," Daniel replied, grudgingly gracious now that he'd won the argument. "Look, I do appreciate this, alright?"

"Don't go getting sentimental on me now, Sousa," Jack said and smiled at the eyeroll he could practically hear. He could see it in his mind-- Daniel, slouched into the right arm corner of his chair, phone holding up his forehead, hideous bahama print shirt unbuttoned at the top in deference to the filthy desert heat.

"How's the fatal wound?" Daniel asked instead.

"Fine," Jack replied. He did not touch the site where the bullet had torn through his chest and narrowly avoided his heart. It ached in cold weather.

"Hm," Daniel said in reply.

"Time to go," Jack said, glancing at his watch. "I've got a meeting with a local councilman."

They exchanged farewells, and rang off. Jack grabbed his coat and headed to the automat; he did have a meeting, but it was in another hour.

It was busy, but Angie spotted him right off the bat and gestured him towards the empty seat at at the bar.

"Coffee for you, Boss?"

"Thanks Angie," he said and nabbed a copy of the Times from the empty stool besides him.

Angie poured him a neat drop of coffee while he perused the headlines. Then, she set the pot back on the burner, and returned. Jack made it past the sports page before he finally glanced up with a raised eyebrow. Angie, chin propped on one palm, grinned at him triumphantly.

“Can I help you?“ Jack asked.

“What’s it like in Los Angeles?” she asked brightly. “Ya think maybe I’m more Hollywood than Broadway?” She tilted her head into a statuesque pose.

Dry desert dust, black matter, heat flashed through his mind. The flash-bang-punch of a bullet through his chest and the low slant of orange sunlight through the hotel blinds. Daniel’s hideous shirt collar flapping against his collarbones, Peggy’s determined grip on his wrist as hospital ceiling lights flashed by.

Jack closed the newspaper and gave her a look. “You’re better off here,” he said.

She gave him a sharp gaze and opened her mouth to reply, but the pointed throat-clearing from the corner booth finally escalated to irritated, “Excuse me, miss”es. Jack stared at her until she sighed, rolled her eyes and yanked the coffee pot off the warmer to deal with other diners.

“Don’t you miss them?”

He looked up, and she was back again, blinking her big, green eyes at him.

“Don’t you have other tables to attend to?”

With a huff, she pushed off the counter. “I just figured we’d have something in common.”

He shook his head and glanced at his watch. Time to go.

 

It was warm for another week, and then the temperature sunk, the days shrank, and suddenly, New York City had plunged knee-deep into winter once more. In the latest set of reports from Los Angeles office, Daniel wrote of an arsonist who had been setting blazes to the hills out in Brea, just past the citrus groves. He noted, curtly, the hot wild gusts of winds that had made it nearly impossible to control the fires once they got started, but Rose had done one better and snuck in a photo of Peggy and Daniel, sunglasses on as they looked out over blackened hills. They wore short sleeves and light cottons. Peggy’s cheeks were flushed—from tan or sunburn, perhaps. In his office, tucked up against the radiator, Jack flipped the folder shut and pinched the bridge of his nose.

“Chief,” Anderson said, knocking his knuckles on the door frame as he leaned in. “I’m headed out. You leaving yet?”

“Yeah,” he said, and heaved himself out of the chair. “Me too.”

Outside, the breeze had picked up to steady, strong gusts. Anderson headed in one direction, and Jack in another, both of them hunched miserably under their heavy wool coats. The sky had already darkened, street lights gleaming wan and yellow on skinny gray poles. With most stores closed and signs dark, Jack could feel the moodier, seamier life of the city creeping into awareness. It barely scratched his awareness though—not like Los Angeles evenings had, unforgivingly unfamiliar with city streets full empty at night.

 A figure veered into his pathway, and it was only through the years of training that his fists didn’t go swinging when she latched onto his arm. He stumbled a little, automatically grasping her shoulder to steady her.

"Christ, Angie! "

The young woman stared at him with wide, green eyes, flashing with relief for a bare moment before she smiled brightly at him.

"You're headed up to what, 75th? Walk me back, I'm on your way," she instructed him, an unfamiliar edge in her voice.

He frowned, but even in the low light, the smudges of exhaustion were visible, and her lipstick had worn off long ago. A lingering nervousness kept her grip on his arm tight, and he opened his mouth to ask what was wrong, but her smile went strained around the edges the longer he held her gaze. More concerned than irritated now, he tugged his arm free and dropped it casually over her shoulders, and she sank into his warm side gratefully.

"Say, doesn't Stark let you stay in his place rent free?" he asked as they shivered and shook their way down to the subway platform.

"Rent isn't the only thing money pays for, and besides, I am paying rent," she sniffed, for effect, then again for real. "Just on a delayed payment plan," she added slyly.

That startled a laugh from Jack, and Angie looked smug even as she shivered against his side piteously. Though he reminded himself firmly that she was an actress of considerable talent, he could feel himself weakening.

The subway train shrilled to a stop and the doors whooshed open. "Ladies first," he sighed.

"You seem to be in a mood tonight," she said as they took their seats. The car was only half full, this late in the evening.

"I have no idea what you are saying," he replied truthfully.

She taped her lower lip with one pink nail.  "Let me rephrase.  You are always in such a mood.  Have you thought about taking a vacation?"

"Just got back from mandatory leave, " he said. “That was plenty restful.”

She squinted at him. “You mean those two months you spent in the hospital in excruciating pain and whining about the pudding?”

“I have no idea what you are saying,” he repeated. “And how would you know anyways?” Though from the look she gave him, he could supply his own theory with something like Peggy Carter with fair accuracy.

"At least a night on the town," she wheedled. "Hey, I'm auditioning for something for now, it's got dancing, good music, a little vaudeville comedy and all that. You should see it, if I get the part. "

"And if you don't? " he asked dryly, earning a light smack for his troubles.

"I got a good feeling about this one," she said firmly, and grinned at him. Despite himself, Jack found himself returning her smile.

“Alright, Martinelli. If you get the part, then I’ll let you take me to your show,” he agreed.

“Oh, and I’m supposed to do all the work?”

He shrugged. “You said it yourself, it’s a vacation for me.”

Laughing, she squeezed his arm impulsively. “Alright, Boss. I’m holding you to it. No backing out now.”

Jack got off the train one stop earlier and walked Angie to the door of the Stark townhouse. Whatever had unnerved her earlier was long gone, and he didn’t press her for answers, but she squeezed his arm gratefully as she headed up the stoop.

 

Work was work was work. Jack excelled at it. He wined Vernon Masters’ replacements, a couple of veterans who were more concerned with the upcoming transitioning of the War Office into separate military departments than they were with espionage, and dined the business rivals of the remaining members from the Council of Nine just to gauge the possibility of a Council of Something Else. He spent long hours on the phone with DC headquarters trying to lay out a feasible five year plan for the SSR, and another long week in the backrooms of Congress, fighting alongside the DC chief to secure funding, even though he knew it was a long shot. Back in New York office, with the old radiators hissing disconsolately at his back and the smell of dank, gently mouldering furniture sunk deep into the office corners, he led his agents in a string of minor victories. If he wished occasionally for the powerhouse energy of his best once-agent, well, the end results were the same. And besides, he had a decent crop of men in New York—stalwart, skilled, brave. They looked up to him, respected his rule, followed him unquestioningly into the thick of it.

But, and he only admitted it to himself in his absolute solitude, that was the problem, wasn’t it?

 

Peggy called late afternoon, when Jack had been ready to head out early for once. The boys, headed down to the usual watering hole, peeked warily into his office as he lifted the receiver, but he waved them out and onwards as soon as he heard Peggy’s voice.

“Marge,” he drawled, and sank back into his office chair, tipping it back onto its back legs while he propped his feet up on his desk. The chair creaked ominously. “Well, to what do I owe the pleasure?”

“It certainly isn’t your charming wit,” Peggy shot back, but without any acidity. “How are you doing? How’s the office?”

“We’re fine,” he said. Across his knuckles, he spun his pen idly. “We’ve not collapsed into hysterics without you yet, doll.” He could imagine her pointed glare at the endearment and grinned to himself. She was far too practical to get sidetracked though.

“Diana tells me you’ve returned to the field,” she told him, blunt and to the point. His mood soured.

“And so?”

She made an irritated noise. “Jack, you nearly died; you in fact, did. Twice, on the operating table. And instead of making the rational decision to stay put while your wound healed, you insisted on haring back to New York, upon which you immediately nearly died _again_ when you incurred influenza from your seatmate on the plane.”

“Why is my secretary reporting to you about me?” he asked suspiciously. “Are _all_ the girls out front informants? Should I be worried?”

“Oh, Jack,” she said, and she sounded almost disappointed. “Rest assured; if I wanted your job, it would’ve been mine ages ago.”

And he believed her, too, though the thought did not rankle as awfully as he’d expected.

“Also,” she added repressively, “they are not your secretaries. They are highly trained agents in their own rights. You know, if you’re short on men, you might make use of them. Aggie has remarkable skill in that acrobatic Brazilian martial form.”

“Sounds scary,” he commented, scrutinizing his nails.

“Well, it’s a damn shade brighter than throwing yourself back out to tangle with Irish smugglers while half recovered only to faint dramatically into the arms of Seamus the Vanisher,” she said.

He winced.

“That is not what happened--”

“Isn’t it?” Her tone was pointed.

He glared sullenly at nothing at all. “I stumbled.”

“Hm.”

“Why does everyone make that noise at me?” he asked, exasperated.

“I heard from Angie that you’re going to see her new show,” she said instead. Jack brightened.

“She get the part? Good on her.”

“Quite, but Jack, that’s the reason I’m calling,” she said, and something in her voice made him straighten up in his chair. His feet came off the table and back on the ground.

“What’s wrong?”

The silence on the other end was unusually cautious for Peggy. “I think we are all by now more than aware of Angie’s… exuberant personality.”

“That’s mildly said, but I get your drift,” he snorted.

“Well it’s the strangest thing,” she said. “She sounded rather… flat about it.”

“Flat?”

Peggy made a frustrated noise. “Distracted, perhaps.”

“Maybe you just called her at a bad time,” he suggested, leaning back again.

“Have you ever seen me jump at shadows, Jack? I think there’s something going on that she won’t tell me.”

“You’ve asked right?”

“Of course I have, don’t be difficult,” she retorted with asperity. “Look, you’re the only other person in New York I’d trust with this, terrifying as that is to admit.” A pause, broken only by the static crackle of a long-distance call. “I’m worried about her.”

“…Alright,” he sighed. “I’ll keep an eye on her.”

“Thank you, Jack,” she said crisply, but with audible relief.

“Only for you, Marge,” he said, and rang off.

 

“Jack?”

He started and raised his head to see Angie half-smiling down on him with bemusement. She was clearly returning from rehearsal, her curls pulled back into a ponytail and her cheeks still pink with exertion. She regarded him, seated on the third step of the stoop with curiosity.

“Whatcha doing outside my door?” Her eyebrows rose. “Were you _sleeping_?”

Jack groaned and stretched, wincing at the pull in his chest. “Waiting for you, actually,” he said, painfully and slowly levering himself to his feet. His everything ached, and he gripped the railing hard for several moments before the wooziness cleared from his mind. When he looked up, Angie was still puzzled, but also concerned.

“You’re crazy,” she told him. “It’s freezing out here, you could’ve died! And then what would I have told Peggy? Or the cops?”

“I’m fine, though concerned your first instinct would be to call someone four thousand miles away,” he grunted. She ignored him and all but shoved him inside the townhouse. “I brought this for you, I heard the good news.” He waggled a bottle of wine at her. “Congratulations.”

“Well, thanks, Boss!” she said, whisking it off into the kitchen and leaving him in the sitting room to poke at the fireplace. “But I’d rather you not freeze yourself to death getting it to me.”

“I tried to stop by the automat, but the redhead said you were on leave and wouldn’t be back anytime soon.” He shrugged, even though there was no one around to see. “You didn’t leave me any choice.” It was curiously warm in the room, he noticed, despite the lofty ceilings and cold fireplace. Once the fire got going, it would be practically summery. With that goal in mind, he lobbed a few fresh logs over the grate and poked about for matches. Angie trotted into the room with two gently steaming mugs. When she saw what he was up to, she tsked and shoved one mug into his hand and shunted him aside.

“This ain’t your regular, run-of-the-mill fireplace,” she said. She flipped open a gilt cap on the side of the fireplace mantle, and punched the button inside hard and fast. From within the fireplace, Jack heard the tinny strike of metal and glimpsed a few sparks skitter along the ash.

“Impressive,” he said, and sipped from his mug. The liquid inside bloomed warm and sweet on his tongue; hot chocolate then, not coffee.

“Stark’s fancy townhouse has its tricks,” she agreed. “Including heating.”

“I’ll say.” He sipped again, and pretended not to see the thoughtful set to her face. Instead, he ignored her in favor of the tiny but vigorously growing fire.

“So tell me about the show,” he said, turning to face her, and she brightened.

“Oh, it’s gonna be a real knock out,” she told him. “I’ve been promoted from a number to a name!”

“That’s a shame, I always thought ‘Chorus Girl #3’ had a certain charm to it,” he said and chuckled when she kicked at him.

“Are you listening to me or what?” she retorted, but she was grinning, and some of the tired lines had smoothed out from her face.

“I am, I am,” he said, settling into an armchair. “Alright, go on, Ms. Martinelli. Tell me about your show.”

“Well,” she drawled, curling up into the chair opposite in a movement so familiar that he realized absently he must have been in Peggy’s usual chair. “If you’re prepared for me to talk your ear off…”

She chattered on about the show, drawing genuine amusement from him as she described the plot (something frippery with sailors and showgirls and escaped zoo animals strung together by the thinnest plot and generous tap-dancing), and the other cast members (led by a well-known actor who was more interested in Chorus Girl #2 than the even more well-known lead actress).

Jack chuckled at the right places and threw in a ready quip at the right moments. But he also observed. At this moment, she was relaxed and in good spirits, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that Peggy’s intuition was right. There were dark circles under Angie’s eyes, and he’d noted the way she’d bolted all the locks at the door and shuttered all the blinds when they first entered the house.

At ten past eight, Jack levered himself out of the too-comfortable chair.

“I’d best be heading out,” he told her, not even needing to feign the reluctance. The wind had picked up outside, and while he only lived a stop away, it was going to be a brutal walk eleven blocks up.

“I’ll walk you out,” Angie said. “You warm enough?”

He smiled briefly. “I’ll be fine.” 

As he shrugged on his coat and adjusted his scarf, he turned to her casually and asked if he could see her again.

Angie blinked, startled. Then, the incredulous expression slid into narrow-eyed thoughtfulness. “Did Peggy put you up to this?” she asked. “Never mind, I know she did.”

“Hey, she only asked me to check in on you,” he admitted. “And now I’m glad she did. I know we don’t know each other all that well, but even I can tell that something’s bothering you. If you’re worried about something, you can tell me.”

“It’s nothing,” she replied automatically, then bit her lip.

Jack waited silently.

“Look,” Angie said, “It’s… I’ve been in these situations before, I can handle them. Half the time, it’s my own imagination causing the most trouble.”

“Angie,” Jack said, frowning, “Are you being threatened?”

She was about to deny it, but he held her gaze and raised his eyebrow and she deflated like a popped balloon.

“Alright, I wouldn’t call it threatened exactly,” she hedged. “But… I think maybe I’m being… followed.”

“When did this start?” he asked. She shrugged.

“I’m not sure. I only started noticing a few weeks ago. It’s not like whoever it was came up to introduce themselves.”

“And this has happened before?”

She flapped her hand dismissively. “That’s real old news. Mitch Parson got it in his head in tenth grade I was his gal without ever bothering to tell me. I tried to set him straight but he didn’t want to hear it, and got a little rough. My brother Andy ended up coming out and ran him off with a baseball bat, and his ma grounded him for the rest of the spring.”

“Jesus, Angie,” he said. “Alright, I’m glad Peggy called me.”

“I don’t know if this is another Mitch situation,” she said doubtfully. “I mean, I really don’t have any proof that this isn’t just all in my head. Maybe it’s just being alone again, you know? Your brain starts throwing out these crazy ideas when you don’t got someone around to take your mind off things.”

“You’re not exactly sitting in the house all day twiddling your thumbs,” he pointed out dryly. “If your gut is telling you something’s wrong, then it’s worth the extra caution.”

“That’s not bad advice, Boss,” she said with a grin.

“Tell you what,” he said, tucking his scarf ends under his coat. “Give me the address of your theatre. I’ll come pick you after work, and walk you back home. We can smoke out this stalker of yours. I don’t got a baseball bat handy on me, but a gun and badge should do the trick.”

 

The phone rang. Shortly after two in the morning, and just as Jack was thinking about throwing in the towel and going to bed. This late at night, a telephone call was never a good omen. It rang again, and he picked up.

“Thompson,” he said.

“Chief, sorry to bother you.”

“It’s fine. Go on, Kimball.” Jack dug his knuckles into his temples as the agent on graveyard shift relayed the call. It didn’t help, as Kimball explained the letter that had come by courier around midnight. The phone operator on duty had signed for it, but had thought it odd that the delivery man wore no uniform of any sort, and only seemed to remember to ask for a signature when she’d offered. It was a thin yellow envelope addressed only to Jack, and Kimball thought that was fishy enough to warrant a midnight call. After a glance at his watch, Jack informed him he’d be down in half an hour and rang off. Luckily, he’d only managed to loosen his tie, so he grabbed his great coat and headed down to hunt for a cab.

At the New York Bell Co., Kimball was waiting, bleary-eyed. Jack traded him a hot coffee he’d picked up from a diner for the envelope.

“Feels like paper,” he commented. With his gloves on, he plucked a letter opener off of Anderson’s desk and sliced through the top of the envelope and turned it over onto the closest desk. A sheaf of papers spilled out—no. Photographs.

Under the yellow light of the lamps, Jack’s own face stared back at him, in a myriad different scenes from his life.

 

There were ten black-and-white photographs, all candidly taken—the most recent was an image of him and Angie coming out of the subway station yesterday. Another was clearly a long-range image, taken through the window of a Southern California motel room, Jack’s blond head just visible past the foot of the bed.

 “You haven’t noticed anything out of the ordinary?” Kimball asked.

“No,” Jack murmured, staring at the images spread across the desk. His gaze lingered on one that showed him in London, stumbling from one bar to the next arm in arm with British Colleague, and felt a sick yawing pit burn open in his stomach.

“What do you think is the purpose of these? A warning?” Kimball’s fingers twitched for the phone. “I’m ordering you a security detail, Chief.”

“No,” Jack said. “That’s not necessary.”

“But Chief-”

“I said no,” he repeated. Gathering the pictures into a single pile, he held Kimball’s gaze. “Don’t tell anyone about these. That’s an order.”

Kimball’s expression soured into disapproval, but he nodded curtly. Softening his tone, Jack told him he may as well head home; Jack wasn’t going to get any sleep tonight anyways. He waited until Kimball had reluctantly left the office before digging out the half-empty bottle of rye from his bottom desk drawer and taking a healthy slug straight from the bottle.

 

“Something’s on your mind,” Angie said around her chewing. She gestured with her pastrami sandwich. “What’s cooking your goose, sugar?”

“Observant little creature, aren’t you,” he said. He picked slowly at his own roast beef, washing it down with lukewarm Coke.

“It comes with the job. You gotta be able to take a good hard look at someone and get to the bottom of what makes ‘em tick, if you want to be convincing on stage,” she agreed.

"Or just a damn good liar," he said.

She grinned and waggled her eyebrows at him. "Ain't too shabby, if I say so myself."

They were sitting at the kitchen table, where the warmth of the house was concentrated under bright, cheery lights. Outside, with a week to Thanksgiving, the rain was coming down in icy sheets, stripping the trees of their golden foliage and coalescing into miniature rivers racing down the gutters. Jack's socks were hanging over the fire shield in the living room to dry, and his hair was still damp, despite a vigorous toweling down.

"You know, this is a sad little dinner," she said, and when he raised an eyebrow at her, she pointed at him. "A handsome fella like you, a pretty gal like me, shouldn’t we be swinging at the clubs, swigging champagne? What’s wrong with us?” Her expression was genuinely baffled.


	2. Death in the City of Angels

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack is dead. He's not too happy about it either.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I thought Jack's shooting made for perfect setup for one of those classic noir narrative tropes, and was very excited to try it out on Agent Carter. But eh, the concept was better than the execution, though I think it wrapped up at a decent stopping point.

Los Angeles, city of reckless glitz and long shadows. A manmade hell of a city that forced itself on a valley of lush and natural paradise. Its asphalt veins and stucco joints teemed with blank lost souls, seething and roiling in sin and crime. Chaos in Eden, and chaos, steeped in blood and the hellfire stink of gasoline; Los Angeles was a crucible, where crime was perfected.

In other, briefer words: I hate this city.

Death, the way I was served, shot through the heart by some two-bit mercenary jackass who hadn’t even the good graces to do it without hiding behind cheap sunglasses, it tends to fill you full up with a fat lot of righteous indignation. I had been less than two hours away from boarding a PanAm flight back home, my cab had literally been on the curb outside. And who ever wanted me dead didn’t even have the decency to try to do it on my own goddamn turf.

Fuck him.

 But alright, fine. Me, bleeding out on the cheap motel carpet on the scuzzy side of Highland Park in short order had become me, laid out on a cold metal surface in the city morgue. Hey, that I’m relaying all this is as astonishing to me as it is to you, buddy. In fact, the only real difference between life and death was apparently a commitment to gravity; I was currently hovering about an inch above the floor, two yards from my actual corpse. And I was still dressed, while the examiner had already cut away the shirt and jacket of my corporeal form. He was gone at the moment, having left the room when his assistant called him away. In his absence, I was working up the nerves to look myself in the face. The glimpses I’d been catching out of the corner of my eyes had my spine dancing with ants. Let me tell ya, it’s no picnic in the park, and even after my stint wading through the mud and gore of Tarawa. There were just some things men weren’t meant to see, and their own dead face is probably one of them.

Then again, who ever really got that opportunity anyways? I stepped (drifted?) closer, then, steeling myself, made myself take a good, hard look.

Proud to say, even in death, I was no slouch in the looks department. My eyes were closed, but overall, the set of my expression was one of sternness and grim determination. In the pursuit of justice, I thought, pleased. Firm, even steely, one might say. I was pretty satisfied, until I noted the gray-blue tinge to my skin; it mostly proclaimed, “Dead.” After that, it was pointless; the unsettling shivers came back with a vengeance. If it was possible to feel sick as a ghost, or whatever I was, well. I did.

I was back to studying the poster on proper handwashing when the door opened and the examiner returned. And in my first bit of luck since this whole death thing happened, he wasn’t alone; Peggy and Sousa clattered in behind him.

“Marge, for once, I’m very glad to see you,” I said with true feeling. As always, she ignored me, though for once, she had a fairly reasonable excuse.

 Peggy drew up short at the sight of, well, me. Daniel, half a step behind her, cursed softly. I watched them both keenly as they approached the body. To my mild disappointment, neither of them burst into devastated weeping, but Peggy did take on that hard, thin-lipped look that promised proper and hellish retribution on whoever was responsible.  Daniel just looked truly upset, which was almost as satisfying.

“Cause of death was exsanguination, from a single gunshot.” Now, the medical examiner was tugging the sheet down, and revealing the nasty scrambled hole in my chest, where my heart used to be. “It was a close-range shot, less than a yard.” He passed them a little tin tray with the bullet. “He was dead before he hit the ground.”

“Jesus,” Daniel muttered.

“Not exactly,” I said wryly, and mourned that no one was able to appreciate my wit.

 

They lingered a little longer, but were called out by the LAPD detective assigned to the case. I thought briefly about staying with my body, but when the examiner followed them out and snapped off the lights, I decided that it was beyond my tolerance to stay in the human meat locker and slipped through the door behind him. Peggy and Daniel were already down the hall, headed towards the exit, so I trailed them, hands in my pockets. Being a ghost was distracting; my legs kept up the motion of walking, and so forward I went. But at the exit, I was distracted by a gorgeous set of pins—and in my defense, it wasn’t so much the girl herself, but the fact that she wasn’t quite attached to her shapely legs, only sitting next to them on a wooden bench in the lobby, one gloved hand patiently atop the thigh of the left leg. I gawped shamelessly. She didn’t seem to have noticed anything out of the ordinary, dressed as she was in a slightly out of fashion gabardine winter coat, thought it was deep summer outside. As she peered patiently about, she met my stare and smiled prettily.

“Hello,” she waved, taking her gloved hand off her leg. “How do you do?”

I returned her greeting on sheer force of habit.

“If you’re waiting for the captain as well, you’re welcome to take the other side of the bench. They are awfully slow here,” she told me.

“Thanks for the tip, but I got to shake a leg,” I said, and winced belatedly. “Good afternoon.”

 By the time I found Peggy and Daniel again, they were already outside and halfway to the car. Still unsettled by the sight of the girl, I had no thought but a determination not to let them leave without me, and next thing I knew, I was in the backseat, perfectly positioned in the center. My foot, raised for a run, gave me another nasty shock by disappearing into the gearshift. I yelped, jerked back, and for one awful moment, sank into the disgusting vinyl of Sousa’s car like it was foam. My arm shot out and gripped the shoulder of the driver seat, which decided to stay solid for some reason and I pulled myself forward and out of the seat just as Sousa started the engine and pulled away from the curb. I grimly hung on even as the vinyl under me seemed solid as rock once more.

“Still heading back east?” Daniel asked Peggy as he maneuvered the car out onto the main street.

“You better not,” I said to her.

“I better not,” she sighed. I beamed. “New York office can handle another couple of weeks without me. You’ll need help looking into Jack’s killer. He was the chief of the second-largest SSR bureau in the nation; this will be a major investigation.”

“Los Angeles office is happy to have you, Peggy,” Daniel said.

 “I’ll stay until we find out who killed him,” she said with quiet intensity. “I owe this to him. He wouldn’t have—it shouldn’t have been…”

Without looking away from the road, Daniel reached out and took her hand. His thumb stroked her knuckles with a kind of sweet intimacy, and her fingers tightened around his. I stared at their clasped hands, surprise rolling through me. So it’s like that now, was it?

They drove the rest of the way to Stark’s villa in silence.

 

I hadn’t had much chance to see Stark’s West Coast haunt when I’d been alive, but it was somehow everything I’d imagined a cocky sumbitch with enough money to teeter on the wrong side of taste to have. The driveway must have been a quarter mile long, an actual walnut grove lining either side. The house itself had that affected Spanish glamour that was so popular in California south of the Tehachapi Mountains. I had to admit, I wouldn’t have minded putting up in the guest room of the splendid old pile, instead of my musty hotel lodging. It would have been infinitely more comfortable. Another point—I may not have died at all. With that cheerful thought, I loped into the house behind Daniel and Peggy.

“What ho, Jeeves,” I greeted as Jarvis answered the door and ushered them in. 

“Is it true, then?” he asked Peggy with a concerned frown. She nodded once, sharply.

“It’s Jack alright,” she said tightly. “Is Howard in?”

“The lab, with Dr. Wilkes,” Jarvis answered. “Agent Carter, I’m so terribly sorry for your loss. Director Thompson was a credit to the SSR.”

“Thank you, Mr. Jarvis. Your sentiment is appreciated,” she replied with a muted smile.

“Thanks, Jarvis,” I added, touched, and drifted down the hall alongside Daniel. “He’s not so bad, actually.”

Daniel twitched, and for a moment, I thought he heard me, but then he sneezed explosively. I snorted and rolled my eyes.

 

Carter led the way into the bowels of the sprawling, opulent mansion that gleamed with dark, polished wood and wide, plentiful windows. The lab was slightly offset from the main bulk of the building, connected by a long, tiled corridor that cut through a lush garden that dripped shamelessly with blossoming flowers twice the size of anything I’d seen anywhere else. Bougainvillea spilled across the window ledges along the corridor, embarrassingly eager to thrust their vivid pinks and purples into sight of the fat, buzzing bees that bobbed among the leaves. At the end of the corridor was a door, a heavy, blast-resistant monstrosity, Carter depressed the buzzer and after a moment, the door unlocked with a click. Inside, Howard Stark and Jason Wilkes were huddled around a blackboard, juggling three different colored lines of equations. Stark clapped Wilkes on the shoulder before turning to Carter and Sousa.

“So, Peggy, what’d you find?” he asked. His usually mobile expression was serious.

“Rather bad news, I’m afraid,” she replied. I rolled my eyes once again. The British flair for understatement wasn’t nearly as funny as the British thought it was. “Jack was shot at close range, died in minutes, if not instantaneously,” she continued as Sousa lowered himself into a chair. I took the opportunity while they were recounting my death to poke around the laboratory. I had to admit I was curious—it wasn’t as if you had the opportunity every day with free reign over Howard Stark’s private lab.

There was the massive black matter containment chamber for Wilkes still in the center of the room, yet to be dismantled and remade into something else. I wandered through the glass and back out the other side, marveling at the way my limbs slipped straight through the glass just by my thinking it. In another corner, the innards of a car engine gleamed dully. It looked fairly normal, except for the way it hovered gently above the table, tethered in place by thick nylon rope. I passed my hand under it, curiously, but didn’t feel any

Finally, I wandered to Wilkes’ side and peered over his shoulder. The numbers and symbols looked about the same as scrambled eggs to me, and I said so aloud.

Wilkes laughed. “I suppose it may seem that way to some,” he said, turning. “But-”

We gawped at each other.

“Jason?” Peggy asked from the other side of the room. “Did you say something?”

“JesusJosephandMary,” Wilkes breathed, going gray as he stared at me.

“You can see me,” I said, in much the same tone of voice. “You can see me?!”

“But you’re dead!”

“Yes,” I agreed excitedly. “Yes, I am! But you can see me!”

He nodded faintly.

“Well, that’s marvelous, that’s a start,” I said encouragingly.

“I’m hallucinating,” he said, but it sounded like a question.

“Jason, what are you hallucinating?” Peggy demanded, tone sharp with concern as the others hurried over. I grinned at her widely and pointed at Wilkes.

“He can see me!”

Wilkes’s eyes darted to me then back to Peggy. He swallowed so hard the click was audible. “It’s, that is.” He glanced at me again.

“Better spit it out; you can’t keep secrets from her. She’s a pitbull with a bone, that Marge,” I told him.

Faintly, he relayed all this to our stunned audience.

Chaos in the lab followed promptly.

 

Once they’d finished establishing that Wilkes was neither hallucinating nor insane, they all passed around a tipple of Stark’s strongest scotch and got down to interrogating me via third party.

“So,” Daniel began warily, eyes tracking aimlessly between Wilkes and the blackboard, “Can he tell us what happened?”

“You can tell him I’m right here,” I told Wilkes, and plunked myself down next to Daniel on the lab counter. The scientist didn’t say anything, but he watched me fixèdly, and Daniel watched him, and I grinned gleefully as Sousa’s face made a turn for the greener as he drew up tighter and stiffer than a board.

“Oh, honestly, Jack," Peggy snapped, and strode forward aggressively so that I was forced to move or see just how insubstantial I was in comparison.

“How do you do that,” I marveled. “Alright, Doctor, tell ‘em I know about as much as they do. I’d just hung up the phone, and was heading out when the door knocks. I open, and some guy I’d never seen before blows my heart out my chest. He rifles through my briefcase, but I can’t exactly do a full inventory of it and tell you what’s missing, can I?”

Jason Wilkes repeated all this to Peggy and Daniel. Stark I noticed, was not paying attention; he was vibrating out of his skin with excitement, waving a series of increasingly bizarre doodads that crackled ominously in my general direction.

"This is remarkable," he was muttering. "Unbelievable. Dr. Wilkes, you say you've never been able to see the dearly dead before, right? Well, I wish I had a base line to compare to, but I think when the dark matter possessed you, it altered your brain somehow, and your sense of perception-"

"Howard!" Peggy said sternly, and his head snapped up in surprise. She eyeballed him meaningfully. "Science later, justice now?"

"If I had my way, they'd go hand in hand," he declared loftily.

"Can I just say, for the record, how unsettling I find all this?" Wilkes said. "I'm a man of science, and yet." He gestured helplessly in my direction. 

"I've been told I defy expectation," I told him. "Though admittedly, not exactly in this way."

He sat down abruptly.

Meanwhile, Sousa had gotten on Stark's phone, the receiver jammed between his ear and shoulder while his hands scribbled down notes on scrap paper.

"Uh huh.. Yeah. Alright, that's it?" He paused, nodded absently. "Ok, great, thanks. I owe you one." He hung up and brandished the sheet. "The briefcase is being worked over by forensics, but I got a list of everything that was found inside it. Maybe Jack can take a look and see what's missing?"

"Excellent idea, Daniel," Peggy said, softening. He beamed at her and the rest of us pretended we were somewhere else while they made gooey eyes at each other.

"Alright, so show me the list," I finally ordered, and Daniel lay it on the lab table and backed well away. It was pretty thorough, from the files I'd gathered on the Council of Nine and Whitney Frost, to a few reports I'd meant to catch up on during the flight back. They also listed the candy wrappers I'd never gotten rid of and it amused me to think of the lab rat painstakingly unfolding and counting out the Wrigley's wrappers I'd never cleaned out. That was brief though, since all it took was a single glance down the list to see what was missing, and my mouth twisted into a grimace before I could hide it.

"What?" Wilkes asked, the only guy who could see it. "What is it, what's missing?"

I looked at him grimly. "Carter's service file."

 

Daniel was furious, of course. "You did what? You had British intelligence pull her files, in order to blackmail her? Were you out of your goddamn mind?" He crossed his arms, then turned an expectant glare on Wilkes.

"I did what I had to in order to get her line," I retorted. "I'm her superior, I would have found out anyways."

Wilkes repeated this delicately to the room at large, upon which Daniel scoffed furiously in delayed reaction. His expression was apoplectic, and if we hadn't been in the middle of an argument, I would have thought it better entertainment than the circus.

Stark clearly thought the same, but managed a serious expression as he asked Peggy what was in the file that was worth murdering a high level government agent for in what most cases would be considered an incredibly risky hit-- broad daylight, in a hotel.

“Secrets,” I told him. “Scandals. Lurid tales from her all-girls boarding  school." Wilkes only raised an eyebrow at me.

“My service record,” Peggy said instead said tersely, “extends beyond espionage behind German lines. There was a reason why they'd recruited my brother and me.”

"What, like domestic espionage among the British elite?" Stark asked, brows furrowing.

"Close, but no cigar," I said.

"Not quite," Peggy said delicately.  Upon more blank stares, she sighed with exasperation and explained.

They all stared at her, aghast.

“You are a magnet for trouble, Marge,” I said.

Wilkes told this to Peggy, who scowled.

“Thank you, Jack, for your ever helpful input,” she told the table mounted winch to my right peevishly.

I laughed. “Oh, boy, I’m gonna miss you guys,” I said. “Say, tell ‘em that, Wilkes, will ya? Let them know they’re good people, and they’ll get through this just fine.”

Jason Wilkes gave me a strange, concerned look. “That sounds like a good bye, Agent Thompson.”

The light, fizzy feeling was growing stronger and spreading through my chest and limbs. “You know what? I think it just might be one.”

 

I blinked and found myself outside. The palm tree above me, its unfamiliar spiking leaves casting striped shadows below. I myself had no shadow, and that was unnerving, so I ignored the thought and observed my surroundings instead. I had just been inside of the lab, and now I was not. Somewhere in my mind, I thought I should have been a little more startled, but after the ultimate shock of death, I couldn’t quite bring myself to care. Instead, I noted that the sun seemed hot, the air warm, and the dark-haired gentleman in the British Armed Forces uniform looked friendly enough, but was also worryingly translucent.

“Agent Thompson,” he greeted crisply.

I looked at him warily. “Yeah, that’s right. And you?”

He smiled, teeth straight and white and familiar, and I knew what he would say even before he opened his mouth.

“Michael Carter, at your service.”

“Another one, huh?” I said dryly, shaking his hand. Both of us, I noted distantly, were a little transparent under the strong sunlight, but his grip was firm and warm. “Nice to meet you.”

“Please, call me Michael,” he said, and I returned the favor. “Now, let’s say we walk a ways?” He inclined his head.

We were outside in the Stark gardens, the sprawling mansion behind us and a picturesque tile path winding through and down a sloped hill of carefully curated vegetation. He strolled along the tiles, and I followed along.

“So,” I finally said, breaking the easy silence. “This is death.”

“This is death,” he confirmed.

“Alright,” I said, scratching my forehead. “I mean, I didn’t think I was a shoo-in for the pearly gates exactly, but I can’t say I expected this either.”

He smiled. “This is but one facet of death, Agent Thompson. Unfortunately, you aren’t quite prepared for the rest of them.”

I squinted at him, suspiciously, but he was maddeningly unreadable. The original Carter inscrutable spook, I suppose. “Not sure how much deader I can get.”

Michael cocked his head toward the path below us, which seemed to wind off the cliff and straight into a brilliant white light.

“Well, Agent, would you like to find out?”

I cast one last look back at the house. Sure, I'd miss them, but they had this well-in-hand. I'd been a great boss, after all. I turned to Michael. “Might as well,” I grinned. “Lead on, pal.”


	3. the girl with a thousand names

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A mysterious client who is not all she seems, and a girl who may or may not be missing-- just another day for private eye Peggy Carter and her loyal guy Friday, Daniel Sousa!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is kind of a cheat, because I'm not totally willing to toss this out. But it'll probably be significantly revised, which means it may or may not ever make it, and I'd like to be a little more up on LA history and geography before I attempt any more of it. But I'm fond of the set up, at least, so there's that.

_It was raining that morning. I remember, because storms have become something of a novelty since I moved to the City of Angels. And it wasn’t just that early drizzly coastal fug that burns off just past sunrise, but true blue, honest to god, bone freezing rain. A proper early winter downpour that slicked the streets to a high, oily shine and turned Sepulveda Blvd. smoother than a greased pig at a county fair._

_  
I’d gotten in late that morning, the trams running slower than usual because of the weather. Even if I had the money for a car, I didn’t have the leg for it, so I was at the mercy of the department of public transportation. It was almost nine-forty by the time I’d hauled my sorry, soaked corpse up to the second floor office off of Fair Oaks in Pasadena. Luckily for me, the boss hadn’t gotten in yet._

_Unluckily though, the client had._

_She was a good-looking dame, curls perfect and dress dry, though don’t ask me how. Her dress was black, which at that time had seemed an unfortunate color on someone so young and beautiful. In hindsight, it’d probably been a warning._

_Sometimes, I wonder what would have been, had I told her to try somewhere else, maybe where the private eye in residence was actually around. I could have handed her a list of contacts around town that I’d like a favor from. But blame the weather, or maybe the great big tears lingering like diamonds in her gorgeous baby blues. Most of all, blame the stack of unpaid electric bills shoved into the third drawer. Instead of sending her on her way, I poured her a cup of coffee, promised the wait wouldn’t be long, and changed all our lives forever._

 

Daniel eyed the coffee in Ms. O’Brien’s hands, which went on gently steaming, but undrunk. He’d finished his own cup five minutes ago, and was already well into his second, thinner cup. He was about to ask if she’d like him to run to the corner diner downstairs to borrow some cream or sugar, when the door slammed open and Peggy burst inside, water still dripping from her hat and trenchcoat.

“Good morning, Daniel,” she said, hooking her umbrella on the coatrack and unbelting her coat. “Quite a storm, isn’t it?”

“Peggy, we’ve got a client,” he said instead, and flicked his gaze towards Ms. O’Brien.

“Do pardon me,” Peggy said. She handed her coat and hat to Daniel and strode over to the client to shake her hand briskly. “I’m not usually so late, but the rain makes fools of us all. I see Daniel has brought you come coffee. Would you like anything else? Tea?”

“No, no thank you. You are… P. Carter?” Ms. O’Brien asked, wide-eyed. Her gaze flickered from Peggy to Daniel, then back again. She looked startled and just a bit uncertain, though she hid it well.

“I am,” Peggy said, her tone firm and final. “Peggy Carter, private detective.”

“Peggy, this is Ms. O’Brien,” Daniel cut in. He limped his way to her side. “Ms. O’Brien’s got a missing persons case for you. Her sister has gone missing.”

“I’m very sorry, Ms. O’Brien. Please, come inside my office and we’ll talk.”

Daniel waited until the door closed behind the two women before taking Ms. O’Brien’s untouched coffee back to his desk to finish. Then, settled against the wall with the office door just slightly ajar, he propped a notepad on his thigh and began taking notes.

“Ms. Carter,” Ms. O’Brien was saying. “My sister never got along with our parents. They always fought so, and she never ran with any good types at school. She’d been threatening to run away for years before she actually did.”

“And when was that?”

“About two years ago, after our mother passed. I hadn’t heard from her since, but now that my father’s died, I want to find her. Bring her home, back to New York.” Her voice choked up. “She shouldn’t be alone here.”

“May I ask what made you think she’d come to Los Angeles?”

There was rustling and the gentle crackle of paper unfolding. “She always wanted to be in the pictures, ever since we were kids. Look, that looks exactly like her. She must be here, she must have come here to be in Hollywood!”

“That’s quite a small picture, Ms. O’Brien. Are you sure that is her?”

“Positive! That’s my sister, exactly.”

Silence, as Peggy presumably studied the image.

“Interesting,” she muttered, barely audible.

“What is it?” Ms. O’Brien asked.

“Maybe something. Maybe nothing. Ms. O’Brien, could you tell me anything more about your sister? What is her name?”

“It’s Colleen O’Brien. What exactly do you need to know?”

“A general description, height, eye and hair color, any distinctive marks, anyone she may know in Los Angeles, would be useful.”

“About five feet, five inches. Brown hair, hazel eyes. She’s turning 22 this year, oh god I hope she’s alright. Will you take the case, Ms. Carter? Will you find my sister for me?”

Daniel paused his note taking as well. There was a short pause, then Peggy answered affirmatively.

“I will do my best, Ms. O’Brien.”

 

After Daniel had noted the address and telephone of Ms. O’Brien’s hotel and walked her to the office door, he slipped into Peggy’s office and eased the door closed behind him. He leaned his crutch against the desk and dropped into the visitor’s chair. Peggy was slouched in her chair, ankles crossed on her desk. It wasn’t perhaps the most ladylike pose, but she somehow still made it look oddly elegant.

“Well?” he prodded, and in return, she slid a gray newspaper clipping across the table. He studied the small photograph and caption and felt his eyebrows draw together. It was a clip from last week’s society pages of some Hollywood gala. Colleen O’Brien was captured mid-laughter and turning away from the camera, half-hidden behind Marlene Dietrich. It wouldn’t have been any more or less unusual, except that in tiny print along the bottom of the photos, it read, “Glamorous star Marlene Dietrich mingling with friends at Stark Industries’ inaugural West Coast Stark Medical Gala.”

When Daniel looked up, Peggy was staring at him intently.

“Your thoughts?”

“Coincidence?” he suggested, then shrugged when she raised an eyebrow. “Hey, it could be.”

“Could be, but probably not.” Sighing, she swung her legs off her desk and stood up. “Well, Daniel, looks like we’re paying a visit to the Forge.”

 

_Howard Stark. If there was ever a man so brilliant in the head and infuriating everywhere else, I’d eat my tie. The man embodied eccentric millionaire with such panache that Charles Lindbergh probably asked him for tips. He and Peggy go way back, to the war, when they both worked at some shadowy government agency that may or may not have discovered the fountain of youth, or so the rumor goes. Peggy never confirms, and Stark has never denied it._

_Stark lived outside of the city, up in the Malibu hills overlooking the Pacific. Don’t be fooled by the genteel villa exterior—the ol’ Stark shack, nicknamed the Forge, is dug straight down into the bedrock below and lined with cement and steel. It’s a bunker, except that it’s not so much to keep things out, but to keep his mad genius in. If he wasn’t essentially a decent sort with no stomach for cruelty, I suspect that nobody, much less the boys in blue with their own vices and shades, would have stood any sort of challenge. Lucky us, Stark was far more interested in blowing himself up, and mostly by accident, than anyone else around him._

 

Peggy pulled to a stop at the gates and leaned on the horn. The rain had mostly tapered off in intensity, but still lingered on, mulish and steady. Beneath the iron gates, a small river coursed down the paved driveway and twisted into the roadside gutter. After a moment, the gates lurched to life, and Daniel watched closely, never tiring to seeing Stark’s brilliant ideas play out in real life. They drove up, winding past the wind sculpted olive and lemon trees and pulling up in the courtyard of Stark’s sprawling hacienda. The off-white arches and sienna tiles glowed charmingly against lamplight and the vermilion bougainvillea, oddly welcoming even in the overcast gloom.

Peggy had barely set the parking brake before the front door opened and a tall, thin figure hurried outside, lofting a large, black umbrella.

“Ms. Carter and Mr. Sousa,” the man greeted in a cut-glass British accent, not unlike Peggy’s. “What brings you here, and in this rain?” He opened the door for Daniel and waited patiently until he’d levered himself upright, crutch and all.

“A case, I’m afraid,” Peggy said, coming around the car and joining them in the doorway. “Hello, Mr. Jarvis. It’s good to see you.”

“And you both, as well. Please, come in. Mr. Stark is in the laboratory; I’ve alerted him to your presence.”

Daniel followed the two of them at a leisurely pace. Peggy and Jarvis were catching up on small talk now with an easy familiarity. He knew they’d once worked together on one of Peggy’s earliest cases, involving Howard Stark, before she’d hired Daniel, and that they’d come out of it with a genuine mutual respect and affection for each other. He always figured that Jarvis would have been Peggy’s guy Friday, if he wasn’t already Stark’s. Now, Jarvis looked happy to see Peggy, but worried and a touch uncertain. There weren’t any signs of nervousness, at least none that Daniel could see, which bode well for Jarvis, and maybe not so great for Peggy’s client.

They took a seat in the parlor, a beautifully outfitted room with tiled floors, thick woven rugs from Panama, dark wooden furniture and a window overlooking the garden. Daniel pointed outside.

“That’s where the photo was taken,” he told Peggy after Jarvis had excused himself to bring up some refreshments. Peggy joined him, arms folded and head tilted thoughtfully.

“Yes. So, we are sure that Colleen has been here. Now,” she dropped her voice to a low murmur as the sounds of rapid footsteps grew louder. “let’s hope we can find out why. Howard!”

“Peggy Carter, as I live and breathe,” Howard grinned in reply, hurrying forward for a quick exchange of kisses and handshakes. “How are you? And Daniel too. Have a seat, you two, what are you doing, standing around the window? Is there something to see?”

“No, Howard, we were just looking at your garden. You must have some lovely parties this time of year.”

“Oh, yeah, absolutely. Had one just last week. You hear about it in the papers?” He smiled, but behind the affable expression, Daniel could see the sharp, wary curiosity in his eyes. 

“Of a sort,” Peggy replied. “Can you tell us about it?”

“Sure, I mean, there’s not much secret to it,” he shrugged, kicking back in his seat. To a stranger’s eye, it was a casual, careless sprawl, but Daniel knew him just well enough to note the nervous rhythm his pointer finger beat out along the back of his chair. “It’s the annual West Coast Stark Medical Gala. Inaugural, in fact. I’m pretty sure I had the office send you an invitation, in fact.”

“Must’ve gotten lost in the mail,” Peggy replied so blandly that Daniel knew for certain she’d probably seen it and decided to use it to mop up a coffee spill. Howard looked skeptical, but shrugged.

 “It went well, a speech here, a speech there, handed out a few awards and grants,” Howard said. “It would’ve been pretty stultifying, probably, but I had my assistant throw out a few invites to Hollywood, just to keep things entertaining,” he winked, then laughed. “Boy, you shoulda come, Peggy, just to see the expression on Doctor Tonkin’s face when Julie London walked onstage with his award.”

“I’m sure it was something,” Peggy agreed. Daniel mourned the loss of that invite and his future romantic bliss with Julie London.

“Anyways, that was all,” Howard said. “Not sure how it fits with your modus operandi, to be honest. What’s going on?”

“We’ve got a case, Howard. And no,” she held up a hand to stall his replies. “You aren’t a person of interest. Not yet, anyhow. But you, or rather, your party, is one of our leads. Can you help us identify someone who was here last week?”

Howard frowned thoughtfully. “I could try, but I warn you, I didn’t have much to do with the guest list. Mostly, my front office arranged everything and sent out the invitations.”

“Anyone I can reach out to in particular?” Daniel asked.

“Sure. I’ll give you the number for my secretary. Let’s see what you have first.”

Peggy slid the crumpled news clipping out of her purse and handed it to Howard. “Not Ms. Dietrich, of course,” she told him, “but the young woman, in the back. She’s laughing.”

“Yes, yes,” Howard blinked distractedly. “I know who you mean. Why, I suppose you can call off the search then.”

Peggy and Daniel exchanged glances. “Do you mean you recognize her? Colleen?”

“Colleen?” Howard look confused. “Who’s Colleen? I thought you were looking for this girl.” He tapped Colleen O’Brien’s face.

“Do you mean, that is not Colleen O’Brien?” Daniel asked slowly, and Howard frowned, and nodded.

“Well, she may be, for all I know. But to me, she’s Dottie. Dottie Underwood. My secretary at Stark Industries,” he explained. “She’s the one who planned the charity shindig last week. Did a damn good job, too, too good, probably. I gave her the week off since she’d looked pretty peaky by the end of it. What’s all this about, anyways? Is she in trouble?”

“I can’t say, yet,” Peggy told him gently. “But it does look like we must speak with Ms. Underwood soon.”

“What do you mean, ‘peaky’?” Daniel asked. “Was she sick or something?”

Howard frowned. “Well, she wasn’t herself by the end of the night, in any case. She’s a bright little spark in the office most days, and loves a good bit of socializing. But that Medical Gala wasn’t easy to pull off, let me tell you. We almost didn’t get our guest of honor out here in time, he was off the grid in Eastern Europe or something, then the venue backed out two days before show time, and so we moved it to the backyard. Dottie practically ran herself into the ground, and Ana caught her napping under the rose trellis on a pile of organza ribbon and clipboards at nine in the morning. I thought she looked well-recovered by the time the gala rolled around, but after the cocktail hour, she had gone all pale and quiet. I told her to go home.” Howard shrugged. “Peaked.”

Peggy and Daniel exchanged looks. Peaked, indeed, or perhaps scared?

“I think you had better give us any contact information for her, Howard. There’s a few things we need to speak with her about,” Peggy said.

“Does this mean you won’t be staying for lunch?” Jarvis asked from the doorway, looking distinctly crestfallen. He was wheeling in an enormous cart topped with hooded salvers of food. For the good of the case, Daniel elbowed Peggy hard and widened his eyes meaningfully. To be specific, in reminder of the fact that they’d skipped lunch, and had about five quarters left in their emergency lunch fund stashed in Daniel’s desk.

“It’s probably not as urgent a matter as that,” Peggy said, eyeing the offerings of Mrs. Jarvis with polite hunger.

Howard clapped, beaming. “Then stay for lunch, stay for more! I got something new I’m working on downstairs, Peg, you won’t believe it ‘til you see it. And Daniel, you! I got something that’s going to knock your socks off. Well, one sock. But maybe both. Ah, you’ll see.”

 

_Colleen O’Brien. Dottie Underwood. By the time Jarvis rolled out the cream cake and coffee, I’d already formed a list of questions, longer than my memory, about the case. I could tell Peggy was raring to go at it, too. She kept calm as a cucumber, polite as anything in the face of these old friends, but she’d dart quick, bright-eyed glances at the door whenever she thought Howard was distracted. It’s always been like that—don’t let the stiff upper lip fool you; Peggy never could sit still, not when there was something to chase. And I’d never be one to complain, not when that drive for truth and justice has gotten me out of plenty of scrapes._

_When I first returned Stateside, I settled in New York where my ma still lived. The leg was gone, which couldn’t be helped, but the rot that had settled into my lungs could. Fearing for my remaining health, Ma convinced me to join my cousin Joe in southern California, where he was working in the movies. Unfortunately, it turned out Joe wasn’t so much working in the movies as he was with the mob, and my big, warm welcome to Los Angeles turned out to be Cousin Joe’s sad sack corpse and a night in the local clink for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. If it weren’t for Peggy coming along when she did, I’d likely still be there, or worse._

_But, that’s a story for another time._

They drove back east into the bowels of Los Angeles, riding along the northern foothills of the city. Jarvis had given Peggy an address in Silver Lake, just past the reservoir itself. The rain had lightened, finally, they managed the mid-day traffic easily, making good time. As Peggy drove, they tossed ideas back and forth, Daniel taking careful notes.

“Let’s suppose Dottie really is Colleen,” Peggy mused out loud. “Why would she be Dottie? She may have fallen out with her family, but surely that doesn’t merit a new identity, except in extreme circumstances.”

“Maybe she wanted a new start,” Daniel suggested. “People change their names for less.”

“And why wouldn’t she contact her sister, if they were as close as Ms. O’Brien claimed?” She frowned, drummed her fingers along the wheel. Next to her, Daniel glanced between the pages of his notebook, making notes every so often. “Say, Daniel.”

“Hm?”

She considered the street before them for a moment, then said thoughtfully, “Let’s stop by the Encina Hotel on the way back to the office. I feel Ms. O’Brien may have more behind those widow’s weeds on her.”

 

They pulled to a stop before the apartment building where Colleen-or-Dottie lived, but could immediately tell they weren’t going to get inside anytime soon. For one, there were at least four police vehicles parked alongside them and a small army of officers on the grounds and facing off the rubberneckers and traffic.

“Do you think it’s for Colleen?” Daniel asked, eyeing the boys in blue with a mild level of apprehension.

“You should know by now,” Peggy replied grimly. “There’s never such a thing as coincidence. Come on. Let’s go see what we can salvage.”

They crossed the street, Daniel following Peggy’s assured stride as they approached the apartment. As they marched up, a young officer moved to block their way.

“Sorry, ma’am. No one allowed past this point.”

“But officer,” Peggy pleaded earnestly, “That’s my room on the ground floor. I’ve got to pick something up.”

The young officer looked painfully fresh from police academy, and he glanced uncertainly over his shoulder at the taped off entrances.

“I’m sorry, maybe I can have someone fetch it for you…?”

“Kid, she’s gonna be at this all day,” Daniel cut in, emphasizing a bored, Brooklyn drawl. “Just let her in. What’s going on anyways, huh? A robbery? Hey, it’s not our floor, is it?”

“I’m sorry, sir,” the poor kid stammered. “I don’t know.”

“Oh, please, Mister Officer,” Peggy begged prettily, pressing forward. The officer flushed bright red, gulped, but remained resolute.

“Ignore them, Garcia,” someone ordered firmly. “These vultures don’t get a foot closer to the sidewalk unless I say so.”

Daniel turned, grimacing at the familiar voice. Out of the corner of his eye, Daniel saw Peggy close her eyes silently and mouth a small curse before plastering on a bright smile.

“Detective Thompson,” she greeted. “It’s very good to see you again.”

“Is it?” Thompson echoed dryly, stopping at a distance just short of impolite. He was tall, with wide, bullish shoulders, a severe blond side part, and, just now, an irritated scowl. Daniel found it slightly better than his usual arrogant sneer, which cheered him up a bit. The detective was an old acquaintance, in that Peggy once beat him in solving the case of a missing Bel Air heiress, and forever went down on his radar as a particular nuisance. He was practically radiating his displeasure, from the top of his weathered tan fedora down to his well-worn but polished shoes. “The hell are you two doing at my crime scene?”

“Your crime scene?” Peggy replied sharply. “You mean there’s been a murder?”

Thompson glared at them. “Yeah, you two wouldn’t happen to know anything about it, would you?”

“Really, Detective,” Peggy chided. “If I did, do you truly believe I’d be here, asking you?”

“I don’t know, Ms. Carter. Sure is an awful coincidence though, isn’t it?” he replied pointedly.

“Well, why don’t you tell us about it, and let us see if it is?” Daniel shot back, chin tilting up in mild challenge.

“You know, Sousa, you got real big delusions about your place in this city,” Jack warned, and Peggy stepped in smoothly before Daniel could stump forward with intent.

“Alright, Daniel,” she muttered under her breath. “Detective, we’ve got a client looking for her sister,” she said, turning to Jack. “Give us a name, just in case it’s a match. We’ll be out of your hair soon enough.”

The detective sneered at Daniel, then leveled a long, sharp look at Peggy. “I don’t have time for your client or your nosing around. Get it from the Times like everyone else,” he said curtly.

When he walked off, Peggy grabbed Daniel’s arm and dragged him aside.

“What a jerk,” Daniel grumbled.

“Yes, precisely,” Peggy agreed absently. “Look, I’m going to go around the house, see if I can’t get a look in the windows.”

“What do you need me to do?” he asked. She nodded in Jack’s direction.

“Distract him.”

Daniel made a face, but at Peggy’s look, sighed and nodded. “Fine.”

She grinned.

 

 _The thing was, me and Jack Thompson, we_ really _don't like each other. While Peggy and Jack had, over the bumpy courses of both their careers, come to a grudging respect for each other, I had no such reservations. You’d think that as the mild-mannered Watson to Peggy’s pragmatic Holmes, I’d rate at most a dismissive glance or maybe even a brusque brush off. Thompson, though, fancied himself the_ observant _sort, in keeping with his_ detective _occupation. Not only did Thompson know my name, history of service, he even guessed where I went for my usual drink after work. Thompson was the sort of detective with a chip on their shoulder for no discernible reason. He had the sort of square, good-looking solidness that seemed, at first glance, so bland. But the charming exterior hid a bulldog, with teeth like steel traps, worrying and shredding any promising evidence to its bare, basic bones. Somehow, somewhere, it seemed that Thompson had sunk his metaphorical teeth into my supposedly sordid nature, and had, over the two years we've known each other, began methodically shredding me down. It is genuinely baffling to me. If the good detective is expecting to find some sort of sordid criminal past, he is going to be damn disappointed. The most remotely guilty I've been was last time when I forgot to water my neighbor’s geraniums while they were vacationing, and had to buy replacements before they returned. And it’s not like they even noticed. In any case, I can't stand Thompson and his suspicious eyes and his judging face with, as Peggy says, a frankly unattractive passion._

_But our hefty animosity leaves me with just the precise amount of leverage for holding the detective’s full attention. Peggy finds it useful, I guess._

Daniel waited until Peggy had slunk off casually behind the edges of the crowd, sidling steadily towards the back of the condo. Jack was now deep in serious, scowling conversation with the photographer from the _LA Times_. With cheerful inconsideration, Daniel strode over, wide-legged and lopsided.

“You know if we pool sources, we could get this case wrapped up between the both of us,” he said loudly, and felt a gleam of satisfaction when Jack turned on him with a defensive hunch.

“I’ve told you two to get off my crime scene,” Jack growled, but Daniel just reached over him to shake the bemused photographer’s hand.

“Daniel Sousa,” he said cheerfully. “Assistant private eye. Say, you think you can send me a copy of your photos? Here, let me get you my card.” He fumbled for his wallet, ignoring the photographer’s wide, darting glances and Jack’s angry snort. He couldn’t do much when heavy-handed grips clamped down on his arm and began marching him out.

“Sousa, what the hell do you think you’re doing?” Jack hissed, mad as a wet cat, Daniel thought mean-spiritedly.

“Pushing my advantage, Detective,” Daniel replied. “We have so much to gain, nothing to lose. We should be lending each other a helping hand, don’t you think?”

Jack stopped abruptly, and Daniel nearly went over the curb, his prosthetic leg catching awkwardly against the grass. The detective absently straightened him up, but only to make his looming more impressive. His eyes, Daniel noticed, were quite blue.

“Listen to me, Sousa,” Thompson spat. “This isn’t a game, alright? This is a homicide. A murder investigation, not one of your missing lapdogs or fancypants diamond necklaces. I don’t have time to play tiddlywinks with you and Carter. There is a girl dead, and a family mourning. I think it’s about time you take your crass business far away from here.” With a sneer of disgust, Thompson dropped Daniel’s arm with a little shove, which nevertheless did not upset his balance. Gentle, almost. He looked around warily, suddenly.

“Speaking of your other half,” he said slowly, “where’s Carter?”

“Well, detective,” Daniel said, rubbing his arm and talking fast, “That’s a very astute question, and I can see, and understand how you’ve done so well for yourself as a detective. My half, my excellent, very talented other half, she is-”

“Right here, Detective,” Peggy chirped, popping up behind Thompson, and sending him a wide, bright smile. “Thanks for that lovely pep talk; I’m sure we have enough millionaire heiresses to keep us busy in the meanwhile. Do have a perfectly lovely day, maybe we can catch up over tea some day? Good bye!”

And with a small, flitting wave, Peggy whisked Daniel off to the car at a brisk pace, and it was all he could do to keep up. He resisted the urge to glance over his shoulder at the gawping detective and instead hastily scraped along to the car.

“What’d you see?” he asked.

“Exactly what I’d suspected,” Peggy replied in the same undertone. She handed him off into the passenger seat and swung around to the driver’s seat. “The body in the living room was a resident of Ms. Underwood’s apartment. However, the body is not Ms. Underwood.”

Daniel sucked in a breath then sighed it back out in a long, low, almost-whistle. “So there’s the rub,” he said, tapping his fingers on the car door.

“Aye, indeed,” Peggy agreed, and jerked the car into gear. She glanced back the car rearview mirror, and shot him a tiny grin. “By the by, how much you want to bet that our detective here is beginning to realize that he’s got some catching up to do?”

Daniel craned around to catch sight of Jack, leaving behind the coroner and angrily striding towards them. “Oh, we’ve got to leave them lean and hungry,” he said with a smile, and Peggy laughed, shifted the car into first gear, and peeled out of their parking spot.

 

“D’you see it yet?” Daniel asked. The Encina Hotel’s lobby in downtown was populated by shabby pre-war furniture that struggled to maintain a genteel grandness that seemed a little forced, if Daniel was being honest. He leaned against the polished granite counter and dinged the service bell to “shave and a haircut.”

“Oh, stop that,” Peggy told him. She was craned over the counter to read the guestbook. “Got it. Room 4-B.” She slipped her hand into his crooked arm just as the concierge reappeared behind the counter.

“I’m sorry, we haven’t received any packages for you,” the concierge apologized, which was no surprise, as there never were any packages in the first place. Daniel smiled at him coolly.

“Quite alright,” he assured. “I’ve been told the post on the American continent takes a beastly amount of time to arrive. You never would have seen such delays when the British presided over the colonies. Rule Britannia, tally ho.”

Peggy stamped on his prosthetic foot and dragged him to the elevators.

The room was locked and the mysterious Ms. O’Brien was not in, but Peggy fished out a hat pin and made easy work of the door.

“Here we are,” she said. “Shall we?” Daniel followed her into the small room. The interior matched its exterior—the furnishings were tasteful, but wearing thin in places and the carpet was balding near the door. It smelled of stale cigarettes, aged furniture, and faint flowers. There was one neat suitcase on the foldout luggage rack, scattered make up on the table, a long coat folded neatly over the back of the chair.

“Light traveler,” Daniel observed, leaning on his crutch. “Neat. She’s not planning to stay very long.”

“Yes,” his boss agreed, scanning the room. “Check the bathroom, Daniel. I’m going to see what turns up around here.”

He obligingly hobbled into the small washroom. There was barely any space for him to turn around, much less anyone to hide anything. He looked anyway.

The medicine cabinet had a few bottles, a half-filled bottle of peroxide, and some tinted blue capsule filled with small orange pills. Daniel couldn’t see what they were—no notifications or names on it. He palmed one and looked around, in the water tank of the toilet and under the sink just in case. There was a knife taped under the sink, but that was about it. It definitely confirmed the suspicions that Ms. O’Brien wasn’t exactly as harmlessly grieving young woman as she’d presented herself.

“Daniel,” Peggy said from the room. He swung out of the bathroom, and came upon her frowning at a slip of paper. The suitcase was unpacked neatly, halfway, and there was the black hat from earlier, its black veil crooked. Peggy looked up and handed the paper over, a neutral expression on her face. It was a photograph, of Howard Stark and a bald, older gentleman beside him. They were smiling and shaking hands. The head of the other man was circled in a bold, red pen.

“Well,” Daniel said after a pause, "I guess we’ll need to head back and sample more of Mrs. Jarvis’ hunter’s stew.”


End file.
